Expert: Obama's End to Missile Shield Sends Dangerous Message

The Obama administration's decision to scrap plans for a missile shield in Eastern Europe conveys a dangerous signal to other countries that the United States can't be trusted, says international relations expert Kiron Skinner.

“It does send a message to Russia and to the Poles, to the Czechs, to the world that the Unites States does not live up to its commitments,” Skinner told Newsmax.TV.

“Most of the time, we think that democracies make binding commitments more so than authoritarian regimes or other political types," she said. "But in this case, the United States is reneging on a commitment that has a long history, going back a couple of decades about missile defense to some of its closest allies in Eastern Europe."

Skinner, who directs Carnegie Mellon University’s International Relations and Politics Program and is attending the G-20 summit this week in Pittsburgh, also questioned the White House explanation of the missile defense decision.

"The Obama administration is couching it in terms of Iran, saying that Iran represents the greater threat and that it will deploy a system much closer to Iran," she said. "But we’re not sure when and how that will happen, and it wasn’t presented in a comprehensive package to deal with Iran, but at the same time, deal with the potential of a Russian attack.

"So it wasn’t, in my view, well thought through at all, and the administration may very well have to revisit that issue in the years ahead.”

Skinner commented on Cuban leader Fidel Castro's praise of Obama's speech at the U.N., in which he said the United States has been slow to act on climate change. The United States is not the only culprit, she said.

“It’s part of a whole system of thinking through how we deal at the international level with emissions when, in fact, issues of economic growth, of employment, of a whole range of domestic factors bear upon the very policies that we want to pursue in terms of energy," she said. "It’s a complicated issue and it shouldn’t be just blamed on the United States, and I would hope that the Obama administration would not pin the great problems of energy in the world on the U.S.”

The two major polluting countries refuse even to admit to a problem, let alone deal with it, she said.

“China and India are fast-growing energy consumers, producers in the world and we’ve got to look at those countries and try to bring them into the conversation about climate change and energy policy," Skinner said. "They haven’t made the kind of commitments that they should make given the nature of their fast growing economies.”

The Obama administration's decision to scrap plans for a missile shield in Eastern Europe conveys a dangerous signal to other countries that the United States can't be trusted, says international relations expert Kiron Skinner.“It does send a message to Russia and to the...